… For Managers In knowledge world, productivity is hard to quantify. If you try to adopt old “command and control” style of management to drive knowledge workers, they get even less productive. Don’t command, empower. Don’t control, but lead them instead. Understand that knowledge workers cannot always be productive between 9 to 5. They have […]
Knowledge industry, particularly software, is full of people who possess “know-how” – knowledge of how to get something done. Give them a task, and they will be able to apply their technical skills (read ‘know-how’) to accomplish it. A lot of people possess a very sound “know-what” – knowledge of facts, figures and methods. Give […]
A few years back, when I was struggling with some repetitive/difficult situations at work, one of my seniors (and a good friend) asked me, “Do you know the root cause of your problem?”. He went on to draw a diagram on his notebook, and connected the problem to the other parts of the organizational system. […]
A novice manager tells people what needs to be done. A wise manager listens, questions and challenges. People are not interested in what you tell them to do (command and control). They are interested in what they control and learn from what they are doing (empowerment). Facilitation helps in both. In getting things done and […]
Group dynamics in a team is a strong force. People on the team are used to work in a certain way. They always encounter/expect some specific/known behaviors from their colleagues. They have a fortified belief system about how things should be done in the team. There is a specific way of communication and often the […]
The primary focus of lean organizations/teams is to “eliminate waste”. In an increasingly complex work environment where execution is distributed between teams and geographies, one of the biggest wastes I have seen is “following-up on things”. A typical manager’s task list will feature about 30% (or even more) tasks which are simply following up (read […]
I have been a close observer of team dynamics in a project environment. In last 13 years, I have seen a number of teams that were highly successful, teams that failed initially and then succeeded, teams that succeeded only when there was a fire in the project and teams where success was constant and incremental. […]
Three friends meet over the cup of coffee and some nicely made sandwiches. It is a typical “friends meeting” with no specific agenda. They start talking about their lives, how they navigated through their careers, struggled and found their way through. They narrated their personal stories of triumphs, tribulations and a constant inner struggle that […]
Quality has moved beyond the simplistic definitions like “conformance to customer requirements”. If quality of your product/service merely meets/conforms to customer requirements, it is not remarkable, but a basic expectation. That is because everyone else has mastered the art of ‘meeting’ customer’s requirements. “Total Quality” is much more than just implementing processes or doing rigorous […]